Meena Harris's Feminist Sweatshirt Line Expanding to Scripted TV
Okay I don't have a famous aunt but here is my pitch for a PHENOMENAL WOMAN show
The Kamala Harris distant nepotism cinematic universe has expanded today, as her niece Meena Harris, a multihyphenate best known for her PHENOMENAL WOMAN tee shirt line, has inked a programming deal to develop scripted and unscripted content for tv and movies. According to the Hollywood Reporter, Phenomenal Productions has hired former Universal executive Juliet Liu as head of content and entertainment, and Regina Lee as head of development for film and television.
Is a television program based on a sweatshirt a tall order? Maybe, but luckily, I’m here to offer my services:
EXT. THE WHITE HOUSE - DAY
This is THE WHITE HOUSE, a palatial, ivory-boned, fenced-in estate that is still actually pretty accessible to commoners in the diegesis of the show, especially badass women who march to the beat of their own drums.
We follow various iconic and femme-tastic women who cannot get enough of persisting as they walk along the hallways, going to meetings, grabbing lunch, and engaging in solidarity with one another. We arrive at...
INT. SHOE CLOSET FOR NIKES IN THE PANIC ROOM AT THE WEST WING - DAY
MEENA FARRIS, a phenomenally attractive lawyer-turned-shirt designer, but more importantly, a phenomenally attractive mom in her mid-thirties, but most importantly, the phenomenally attractive niece of the Vice President of the United States AMELIA FARRIS, is good naturedly (and very charmingly) excoriating her handsome and stylish husband NIKOLAS. Meena is looking effortless in a blazer over a $57 PRO SCIENCE PRO DOLLY sweatshirt, lapels arranged just so, ensuring readability of the text. NIKOLAS sports a $55 CHISOLM for PRESIDENT ‘72 crewneck.
MEENA
Babe, you turned the West Wing panic room into your own personal Nike closet after we established that to be a major part of your personal brand at the inauguration?
(she spills coffee on her shirt. She loves coffee. She pulls a $35 PRO-VAXXER tee out of her Telfar and pulls it over her sweatshirt and blazer)
NIKOLAS
Oh, calm down, Meena! They’re not using this space anyway. Your aunt, who you are very close to, gave me permission.
MEENA
I cannot believe you just told me to calm down. That sort of language is coded with sexism, based on the long-held belief that a woman who expresses an opinion is hysterical. Do you not even read my tee shirts?
NIKOLAS
Well, wifey baby, as an award-winning author in addition to being a lawyer, niece, mother, and tee shirt designer, you are pretty funny. You make me and our two beautiful daughters laugh every day.
MEENA
Not that type of hysterical, Nikolas. I mean -- crazy, mad, off-her-rocker sort of stuff, rooted in the Greek hysteria, meaning uterus. This is misogyny. I am so angry I can barely think straight. I have to design a tee shirt to relax. It’s going to say “THANK U, NEXT.”
NIKOLAS
(Interrupting; he’s now wearing a $35 ABORTION IS HEALTHCARE hat, but this isn’t a continuity error.)
Babe, babe. Babe, come on.
MEENA
Nikolas? I’m speaking.
(A laugh track erupts for the first and only time in this show. This was originally going to be more of a lyrical, political satire of a show, like Succession or Cory in the House, but execs were worried viewers wouldn’t get the reference)
What? What??
NIKOLAS
(Staring at her with the look of love)
Nothing. It’s just. You really are a Phenomenal Woman.
Vice President AMELIA FARRIS bursts into the panic room, sporting a $40 SAMOSAS MIMOSAS SAMOSAS MIMOSAS tee, a $45 pair of RBG leggings, and a $35 PHENOMENALLY JEWISH tee wrapped around her waist (we’ll work that into the script later). Her $35 hat says GIRL DAD. [ED. NOTE ON LEGALITY: PHENOMENAL WOMAN SWEARS THEY’RE NOT USING THEIR RELATION TO THE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR MONETARY GAIN]
AMELIA
Maya Angelou’s estate is suing us!
Theme song plays. It’s an original piano sonata that I, Claire Carusillo, wrote. It sounds a lot like the Titanic theme, and also like “Heart and Soul.” Those songs are pretty easy to remember on the piano, even if you haven’t taken lessons in 21 years. Women can do anything.
